Peanut Butter Prices Get Nutty-Consumers Spread Thin

Something that popped up on my radar: Sky rocketing peanut butter prices. If you recall, in a previous post on my blog, I mentioned Corn, Cotton, Gold, and Oil as the “Four Horseman of the Economic Apocalypse.” As more farmers are giving up land for cotton $BAL and corn (ethanol production), that leaves less acreage for other products. Add to that the horrific drought conditions in Georgia and Texas, and poof: Peanut Butter producers have to take pricing power. Joe Six Pack has fallen, and he can’t get . . .a PB and J.

The WSJ reports that wholesale prices for big-selling Jif ($SJM) are going up 30% starting in November, while Peter Pan ($CAG) will raise prices as much as 24% in a couple weeks. Unilever ($UN), which makes Skippy, wouldn’t comment on its pricing plans, but a spokesman for Wegmans Food Markets, the closely held supermarket chain in the Northeast US, said whole sale prices for all brands it carries, including Skippy, are 30% to 35% higher than a year ago. Kraft ($KFT) recently entered the peanut butter market when it launched Planters peanut butter in June. However, the company will already have to raise prices by 40% on October 31st

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